The Boundless

The Boundless by Kenneth Oppel Read Free Book Online

Book: The Boundless by Kenneth Oppel Read Free Book Online
Authors: Kenneth Oppel
kid.”
    Will waits for the machine to pour him a ginger beer, and then takes it upstairs. The second level of the Terrace car has a vaulted glass ceiling, giving a panoramic view. There are only a few people here, maybe because it’s a bit chilly. A man writes a letter on an elegant table that folds down from the wall. At the back of the car, a door leads to the sizable terrace. Will steps out and leans against the brass railing.
    The train, he’s surprised to see, has actually pulled ahead without his even noticing. All the first-class cars are now out of the station, to give the second-class passengers a chance to board from the platform.
    He supposes the Boundless will have to pull ahead again for the third-class passengers too. And then there’s the colonists, who don’t even get to use the station platform. From his vantage point he can see beyond the station building, where the gravel sidings are thronged with humbly dressed passengers carrying odd, tattered suitcases and sagging boxes and bundled crying babies. Will’s used to seeing them in Halifax. Every week ships bring them to Pier 21 from all over the world.
    All around him in the vast railyards, more freight cars and baggage cars are being shunted about and readied to join the Boundless as it edges forward bit by bit.
    Will chews on his pencil meditatively, then fishes out his sketchbook. It’s a beautiful slim thing, brand-new for the trip. The pages are thick enough for watercolors—but mostly he just likes to sketch with pencil.
    He spots a boy standing atop an old rusted boxcar, waving. And for a moment Will feels like he’s waving at himself across time. Before he was rich, he was poor. And just three years ago he lived in a Winnipeg rooming house that backed onto the rail yards.
    He doesn’t miss their old apartment, with its splintered, cold floors, its mean windows, and the hallway smell of cabbage and wet sock. But he often thinks about what Van Horne said to him at Farewell Station. About how you need a good story, one of your very own.
    That day, in the mountains, he was given a story, and a grand one at that. He felt then like his life was about to properly start—that he’d finally have adventures of his own, maybe with his father. But then almost right away his story got derailed and he was just watching his father’s life trundle merrily along the tracks.
    After the avalanche Mr. Van Horne promoted Will’s father to engineer of the Maritime Line. Within the week they were moving—not out West as planned but back East, beyond Winnipeg, to Halifax. Their new apartment was clean and bright and spacious. Shiny store-bought furniture stood beside their shabby beds, tables, and chairs.
    It was a big promotion, and Will’s father said it was Cornelius Van Horne’s way of saying thank you for saving his life. But it soon became clear that the rail baron wasn’t done with James Everett. Van Horne said he showed unusual promise. Before long Will’s father was promoted again, to assistant regional manager of the Maritime Line.
    After that they moved into their first house, not far from Point Pleasant Park. It had a garden that belonged only to them. Will’s shoes got shinier; his clothes got more buttons and fastened more tightly around his neck. He stopped going to the local public school and started at a small private academy.
    Will liked that. He wasn’t so embarrassed to be good at his studies. But he never felt like he fit in properly with the sons and daughters of wealthy businessmen and politicians. He stayed on the fringes.
    Nonetheless there was an art teacher there who encouraged him and gave him extra lessons once a week after school. Drawing changed from being a hobby to a passion.
    At home they got a cook and a housemaid. His parents began entertaining their new friends and going out to social events around the city. His mother seemed to slip into her new life as

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